Avatar: The Last Hunger Games
by Tera253
Summary: In an alternate world of Panem where benders live among them, a story of a rebellion against the powers that be slowly unfolds, and in ways that many people on both sides hardly expected. Life is a puzzle full of surprises, the biggest of which being when said pieces finally all fall into place.
1. 01 The Games

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **This is just a random thing I decided to write late one night out of boredom. While this story opens up under the impression that it's merely the cast of _Avatar: The Last Airbender_ in a Hunger Games setting, fans of _The Hunger Games _can find solace in knowing that they will meet many of their favorite characters in Part II, which begins once these games are finished. Other than that...don't take this thing too seriously. I like both series enough to know a decent bit about them, but not enough to get every little nitty gritty detail right to the T.

Those who wish to skip the tournament itself can feel free to start at chapter 10, which is the closure of said games.

Anyways, here is a reference of which characters are in which Districts. Anyone who thinks I am making subtle shipping references will be shot.

District 1: Ozai/Ursa  
District 2: Zhao/Toph  
District 3: Tenzin/Lin  
District 4: Iroh/Jun  
District 5: Zuko/Azula  
District 6: Long Feng/Joo Dee  
District 7: Aang/Korra  
District 8: Sokka/Katara  
District 9: Haru/Ty Lee  
District 10: Jet/Mai  
District 11: Bolin/Suki  
District 12: Mako/Asami

That said, let the games begin...

**PART I: THE DEATH TOURNAMENT**

**Chapter 1  
**

It was only moments before the games would begin. The tributes were in place, ready to be brought up to the arena. All that remained was the gamemakers' announcement.

"Hello Ladies and Gentlemen, and welcome to the Avatar Incarnates show, with your favorite hosts and gamemakers: Roku, Kyoshi, Kuruk, & Yangchen! In honor of the 79th Annual Hunger Games, we are continuing with our latest trend in bending the rules. This year, the tributes have been chosen based on notoriety, in the anticipation that this will be one the longest, most exciting, sitting-on-the-edge-of-your-seat intense and bloodiest Hunger Games yet!"

"You know," Kuruk raised an eyebrow once they were off national TV, "I'm half surprised we don't go call them Death Games now, especially with the recent changes over the last five games."

"It's a matter of appealing to tradition, Kuruk dear," Yangchen reminded him, "And saying Hunger but Mainly Death Games is much too long."

"We talk about length and yet the arena is one clearly designed to make the games drag out." Kyoshi noted, "Although that's not necessarily a bad thing in this case."

Nonetheless, Kyoshi had a point. It seemed that there had been extra effort put into the building of the arena this time around, which said something given the effort put into the arena each and every year. This year the Cornucopia was surrounded by four watchtowers that had explosive ballistae with accuracy reminiscent of the Yu Yan Archers inside, or so the rumors went. Each tower had an elemental insignia on each face, with Fire being in the northwest, Water being in the southeast, Air being in the northeast, and Earth being in the southwest.

Lakes, ruins, and forests dominated the rest of the arena, but also hidden in the wilderness were 8 different temple-like structures: to the far northwest, a Fire Temple; to the far northeast, an Earth Temple, and to the far northeast and southwest, 2 Water Temples. 4 Air Temples were also in those general directions, but were closer to the central field and the Cornucopia.

The tributes were roaring and ready to go, and moments later, a gong was sounded as Roku announced "Let the 79th Annual Hunger Games… begin!"

As the tributes swarmed onto the battlefield, a traditional chant was announced as well, as was traditional for each and every Annual Hunger Games.

"…and may the odds ever be in your favor…"

The nonbending Tributes scrambled for the Cornucopia the quickest, and their dexterity and reflexes not only kept them from being shot down by some of the benders who were shooting projectiles at them, but also enabled all of nonbenders to make it into the Cornucopia unhurt. Inside they found assortments of weapons, some supplies, and most notably, chi-blocker gear that was strongly reminiscent of the gadgets and tools the Equalists equipped themselves with. Many of the weapons were either dipped in oil or were electrified. Given the torches that were lining the area, it became clear what the oil had been for.

The first fight broke out between Joo Dee and Suki, when the former had picked up a fiery electrified rod that the latter had lunged for. Suki kicked her feet off one wall and clung to the ceiling, a pair of knives now in her hand. Joo Dee did not even move as Suki attacked—she used the rod in her hands to block each and every one of Suki's moves.

"You do not want to attack Joo Dee," she said in a sing-song voice, "you put at risk the fine culture and grandeur of Ba Sing Se."

Suki would hear none of it, but Joo Dee's surprising dexterity had them on edge for long enough.

"Look, Zuzu," Azula chirped, "its father—don't you want to defeat him and regain your honor?"

"His danger score was more than twice mine," Zuko argued, and Azula interrupted.

"Everyone did better than you, little brother," she taunted, "because you're a failure. That's why I'm here—to make sure that District 5 does not shamefully lose both of its tributes within the opening minutes. Come now, you're not afraid of the big bad Career Tributes now, are you?"

All of the tributes were well-aware of the powerful Careers—the tributes from Districts 1, 2, and 4, who were generally much more dangerous than the remaining tributes, usually due to natural skill. The Tributes from District 2 in particular were the ones to watch out for this time—both of them were reckless powerhouses that attacked head-on, and asked questions later. Some of the warier tributes had noticed that both Ursa from District 1 and Toph from District 2 had vanished the moment the gong had sounded. Ozai was burninating his way south towards the Air Temple, which was still a ways off—or more accurately, he was chasing down the female tribute from District 8, who appeared to be a step ahead of him at every turn.

In fact, said District 8 Tribute, who was Katara, ran right past them without even noticing Azula. Her eyes met with Zuko for a split-second that seemed like eternity. The message in her lovely blue eyes was quite clear, and it touched Zuko's heart. She had not said a single word to Zuko, but Zuko knew at once that she was the one, given the message she gave off.

"_If you're still alive when I'm done with Ozai, I'm going to killinate you next."_

Yep, she was definitely the one for him. Hopefully, she'd stave off Ozai long enough for him to challenge his father and regain his honor.

"And with that, ladies and gentlemen," Yangchen announced, "we have our Zutara evidence for the day in the form of said tributes giving each other nonverbal death threats and making eye contact for a grand total of 1.2 seconds!"

Zuko decided to ignore it. After all, they were in a death tournament, and he had stalled long enough. Then again, so was Azula, and she hadn't been hit yet either.

"I'm not going to stick around," she giggled, "looks like one of the careers have taken the Fire Tower, and frankly, I do not wish to be shot."  
No sooner had she said that, than a ballista bolt hit right where she had been standing, engulfing them in a cloud of smoke. Zuko coughed and heard a cannon boom.

"So much for me dying first, Azula" he laughed triumphantly, but was tapped on the shoulder.

"Let me spell it out for you, Zuzu: I'd run if I were you," said the voice. It was Azula, and she was unhurt. Without another word, she sped off in a trail of blue flames, towards the East Air Temple.

* * *

**SURVIVING TRIBUTES:**

Everyone except for one mysterious death


	2. 02 The Tributes

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **in which people die, and dry humor is provided throughout. Updates will be on days that are multiples of 5.

**CHAPTER 2**

The cannon had fired from a death in the Cornucopia. Joo Dee was still calmly blocking Suki's attacks, but was also unable to land a hit on the younger girl. Their fight was only interrupted when Joo Dee's eyes widened and blood splattered over her face. Someone had gotten behind Suki, ripped out her spine, tied it around her neck, and then stamped Suki's feet so hard that her head shot into the air. It didn't even make sense, but it was what happened. A bloodstained Toph appeared from behind what was left of Suki's body as it crumbled to the ground in a bloody heap.

"AW YEAH!" She roared as a cannon boomed. This one was the one Zuko and Azula had heard. "THE TOPHSTER IS IN DA HOUSE!" She was suddenly flanked by Zhao, Jun, and Long Feng. Joo Dee froze, knowing that one of two things was about to happen—either the careers had found their next target, or they and her district counterpart, who was with them, would propose an alliance. Luckily, it was the latter. Jun gave Joo Dee an approving glance. "Well-played for stalling Mary Suki or whatever her bucket was," she complimented, "tag along with us if you want to live another minute."

District 6 was known for its conniving and downright weird tributes most of the time, and sometimes they were far enough out there that one or more of the Career District gangs would ally with them for a while. This was one of those times. Joo Dee did not hesitate to join what was unarguably the most powerful alliance on the battlefield at the moment.

"First blood comes from District 11, courtesy of District 2's female tribute!"

The odds were about 3-to-1 on Toph winning the tournament, and a lot of yuans would unsurprisingly be changing hands after this death match was done and over with. It didn't help that she had been so badass during her training session that the gamemakers had no choice but to give her a 13 out of 12. Her performance had frightened even them.

Zuko was still straggling and dodging ballista bolts being shot by Iroh from the Fire Turret as he sprinted away towards the Air Turret. However, a quick glance up there told him that it was occupied by a trigger-happy female tribute that Zuko recognized as Jet of District 10, especially with his paranoid shout of "A FIREBENDER!"

Zuko figured that between a skill-shot like Iroh and a trigger-happy maniac like Jet, he would choose Jet. As he flipped and dodged to avoid the explosive shots from the Air Turret's ballista, he suddenly heard a woman shout "DIE JET DIE!"

Seconds later, the shots had stopped, and when Zuko looked up, he saw Jet's body being thrown off the tower, missing both its head and its right arm. The tribute that had killed him was hooded and not easy to identify from the distance Zuko stood. However, it was clear that she was holding an arm and a head. She tossed the head into the air, and used the arm to whack it like a baseball out towards the forest, where she also chucked the arm as well.

Apparently this was against some rule somewhere , or more likely, the gamemakers wanted to have a bit of fun. As the cannon boomed for Jet's death (which this time was definitely very clear), a fireball from the sky struck the side of the Air Turret, making it start to crumble. Zuko decided to put some northerly distance between it and him, as going back west would run him back into Iroh's turret—and once you were in Papa Iroh's territory, there was no turning back.

The mysterious tribute spread her feet to keep from falling over as the tower continued to fall. She remained on the roof, holding onto the pole that was holding up an Air Nation flag. She knew she had to jump before the tower hit, as all of the explosive bolts that Jet hadn't fired would go off in a chain of explosions once the top of the tower hit the ground. She lunged right over Zuko, and her hood flew off, causing Zuko to recognize her immediately.

"Mother!" he exclaimed, but Ursa was already long gone. A few moments later, he noticed Katara race by, this time not even stopping to glance at him. She was paving a path of ice which she was sliding quite nimbly on, and it was putting some distance between her and her unseen foe… except that Zuko had a gut feeling he know who said "unseen foe" was.

Almost comically, he turned around to find himself face to face with Ozai.

"Father, you don't have to end this yet!" he argued. "Are you really going to fight your own son?"

It was a stupid question, given their history, but it was worth a shot.

"I WILL END YOU!" he roared, beating his chest. Zuko kicked him in the groin and then in the chest, knocking him onto his back, his fist inches from Ozai's face.

"I challenge you to an Agni Kai," he yelled down at his father. Ozai simply laughed. Zuko did not put down his guard, but he did not need to. Ozai's stunt was unexpected either way. He was able to maneuver himself back into a standing position so quickly that Zuko had no time to react, and he followed it with a powerful stream of sizzling flames that hit Zuko at point-blank range.

"BURNINATION!" he roared, and within seconds, all that was left of Zuko was a smoldering crater about 6 feet in diameter and about a foot deep. He glanced down at the crater, and then grabbed a discarded set of electric nunchucks and a few unexploded bolts from the remains of the Air Turret.

"I WILL BURNINATE MY BURNINATION!" he roared stupidly as another cannon boomed, "THE WORLD MUST BURN IN THE FIRES OF DISTRICT 1!"

He stacked the three bolts he had found into the crater, jammed the electric nunchucks into them and then set the rig on fire. It exploded, and Ozai redirected the flames and lightning towards Iroh's Turret. Iroh was unfazed, and while it did set the Fire turret (ironically) on fire, Iroh was able to escape thanks to the help of some earthbending from Toph and her crew. The Career Alliance currently consisted of both tributes from Districts 6, 4, and 2, as well as Ursa from District 1. Right now, all of said tributes were standing in front of Ozai, glaring angrily at him.

Once Ozai remembered that District 2 and District 4 were also part of the careers, he took off. Zhao and Joo Dee almost took off after him.

"Let him go," Iroh halted them, "If he wishes to be the sole career without an alliance… then so be it."

* * *

**SURVIVORS:****  
**District 1: Ozai, Ursa  
District 2: Zhao, Toph  
District 3: Tenzin, Lin  
District 4: Iroh, Jun  
District 5: Azula  
District 6: Long Feng, Joo Dee  
District 7: Aang, Korra  
District 8: Sokka, Katara  
District 9: Haru, Ty Lee  
District 10: Mai  
District 11: Bolin  
District 12: Mako, Asami


	3. 03 The District Two Girl

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **Nothing to add to this one. Just more Death Tournament.

**CHAPTER 3**

Iroh remained the ringleader of the Career Alliance, and in the frenzy of the bloodbath that was going on around them, he had the tributes split into groups of two by district, except for Ursa, who disappeared back into the shadows. Zhao grabbed a bag of equipment which turned out to be landmines, and as Toph approached the Cornucopia to see who was still lingering around inside, Zhao rigged the Fire Tower with landmines, since it had not fallen, as the fires that were consuming it had put themselves out. Stone did not burn very well.

Haru had cleverly hidden in one of the shadows of the Cornucopia, and he was armed to the teeth. The gamemakers had underestimated his hide-and-strike strategy when they had given him his training score of 4, and he was determined to beat the odds.

Luckily for him, the odds appeared to remain in his favor, and then proceed to turn even moreso in his favor, for Toph approached him, her hands out in the form of a truce sign.

"Fellow earthbenders, right?" she smiled innocently after blocking several grenades with a thick rock wall, "if you stop attacking me maybe we can team up? Kick a little tookas, roll a few heads?"

"You're from District 2, I'm from 9. That's like night and day, Toph." Haru argued,

"Duh," Toph laughed, "District 2 citizens are all warriors. We're the ones that provide goods and serves for the Peacekeepers. Even *I* don't remember what our district's logo was, but I'm inclined to say that we're enforcers or warriors or something badass like that."

Haru hesitated again. "How do I know this isn't a trap?"

"Because the last tribute I ran into that didn't form an alliance with me got her spine ripped out and tied around her head," Toph warned, indicating Suki's blood, which was still covering most of her face and chest. "So don't make me turn to threats."

"I still don't know about this," Haru shook his head.

"Fine," Toph rolled her eyes, "I'll answer it for you—screw you, you indecisive little pansy." She grabbed Haru's head and bashed it against her own head so hard that Haru's head cracked open like a coconut. "AWWW YEAH!" she roared, "ANOTHER ONE DOWN!"

Toph had never planned on allying with Haru anyways, and so while her plans did not go the way she had expected, she still achieved her main goal, which meant the mission was a success.

"You know it's going to be a long, action-packed Hunger Games when even the bloodbath takes time," Zhao commented when Toph returned. "only 4 tributes have died in the last hour."

"Let's change that then," Toph agreed, "clearly they've gone to run and hide."

Katara was one of those who had hidden, holing herself up in the Water Turret. Coincidentally, the boy from District 7 ran up the tower without even noticing Katara. This boy, Aang, was also her temporary ally, but she did not want to make her presence known. She started rigging the tower to prevent others from entering, while Aang zipped to the top to man the ballista.

His shots soon attracted parts of Iroh's massive "Career Alliance", namely the tributes from Districts 6 and 4. Furthermore, Azula showed up, despite not being part of the alliance.

"Surround it," Iroh ordered, and the tributes laid siege to the tower. It made more sense to kill the tributes one by one by outnumbering them than it did to split up and fight each one individually. There was a diversion when Jun was blasted out of the tower by an explosion.

"It's rigged," she stated the obvious as she recovered. The side of her face, arm, and leg were a bit singed, but otherwise she was alright aside from a small headache. "We need to bring it down."

Long Feng was already onto the launching rocks at Aang, while Jun and Joo Dee started fending off Korra and Sokka, Aang and Katara's respective district counterparts, who had appeared to help. None of them except Aang were aware that Katara was hiding in the tower, not even Sokka.

The base of the Water Turret proved to be resoundingly strong, as Long Feng's rocks and Iroh's flames were not even enough to do significant damage. It may have also been because they were being wary as to where they hit. They did not want to set one of the bombs off, nor did they want to knock down the tower in the wrong direction.

Jun and Joo Dee were fending off Sokka and Korra, Jun's speed keeping Sokka from reaching her, and Joo Dee's insane reflexes helping her dodge Korra's many projectile attacks. Her singsong charm of a voice filled the air, and slowly it began to have an effect on Korra.

"The Earth King has invited you to a party at Lake Laogai…"

"Where the heck is Lake Laogai?" Korra asked, as if Joo Dee would answer the question.

"The Earth King has invited you to a party at Lake Laogai," she repeated, remembering her charming of Suki in the Cornucopia, "will you be honored to accept his invitation?"

Sokka noticed that Korra was getting charmed by Joo Dee's hypnotism, but Jun was too swift to let him come to his ally's aid. Aang was still handling Iroh in the front, and Long Feng from behind, and since Katara had rigged the entrance and the lower floor of the turret, she had effectively sealed herself in.

The Cornucopia bloodbath was almost about to be renamed the Water Turret bloodbath with how much was going down there. Jun's efforts were suddenly halted when Ty Lee came out of nowhere and jabbed her arms and legs, breaking one of her arms because of the force with which she punched it. Jun crumpled to the ground, immobile, and she could only look up helplessly as Sokka and Ty Lee closed in on her.

Except that they were thwarted when Toph and Zhao appeared. Toph struck Ty Lee in the forehead with a "small rock", which was actually a two-pronged boulder, where one prong smashed her forehead in and lodged chunks of her skull into her brain, and the other prong shattered her ribcage and hit her internal organs.

"AWW YEAH!" Toph roared again, "BOOM BAM, BABY!"

Ty Lee's body crumpled on top of Jun, and a cannon boomed. Zhao hit Sokka and set him on fire, where he took off screaming fanatically.

"Not bad for a guy who's on fire," Zhao laughed, "I wonder if he realizes that the lake is the other way though?"

"Listen for the cannon." Toph replied. "it'll go off sooner or later."

Aang's situation was rapidly deteriorating. His female counterpart, Korra, was now completely under the control of the District 6 Tributes, and he was besieged in a weakening tower surrounded by vicious Career Tributes who were determined to send him straight to the morgue. He knew that now was the time for him to unveil his coup de maître, and why he allowed the Gamemakers to give him a score of 8.

* * *

**SURVIVORS:****  
**District 1: Ozai, Ursa  
District 2: Zhao, Toph  
District 3: Tenzin, Lin  
District 4: Iroh, Jun  
District 5: Azula  
District 6: Long Feng, Joo Dee  
District 7: Aang, Korra  
District 8: Sokka, Katara  
District 10: Mai  
District 11: Bolin  
District 12: Mako, Asami


	4. 04 The Air Temple Seige

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **You just never know with District 6. You really just never know.

**CHAPTER 4**

Aang switched from ballista fire to the elements, shooting them in every direction, and simply hoping that Korra would not get caught in the crossfire. There was always a way to break the hypnotism. He was miraculously able to hold off most of them, but eventually, he got chased to the roof after a successful shot from Zhao's fireball blasted the ballista right out of the side of the tower.

Aang scrambled onto the roof and utilized the mounted crossbows, rapidly firing them faster than the ballistae. One of them hit Long Feng in the hip, another hit Iroh in the arm, while Korra was also accidentally hit in the arm. Aang knew that it'd be easier just to exterminate Korra given that she was now a puppet of the tributes from District 6, but even in a death tournament, his unwillingness to actually kill anyone was going to cost him—perhaps there was another way though. Perhaps he could remove their power.

The solution for this struck him at just the right moment. A projectile from Long Feng hit Aang squarely in the back, triggering his avatar state. However, just before he could go ballistic, Azula appeared out of hiding, and hit him squarely in the back with a lightning bolt, which shattered his spine, and sent him tumbling off the tower where he hit the ground with a crunch, and similarly, a cannon's boom.

Once Aang was dead, the tributes besieging his tower dispersed. Iroh collected Jun and headed north towards the air temple and the Northern Water Temple. Toph and Zhao took off south to go find and slay some more tributes, Azula disappeared back towards her East Air Temple hideout, and the District 6 Tributes followed Iroh. However, turning away form Korra was just enough time for her to muster willpower to resist Joo Dee's trancelike voice, and she struck. Joo Dee's astounding reflexes saved her life again, and her electrified staff served as her defensive weapon. Korra landed an uppercut on Joo Dee's lower jaw, breaking it cleanly. Korra pumped her fist for a second as she reveled in the moment.

However, a broken jaw was not enough to deter Joo Dee. Within the few seconds that Korra had let her guard down, Joo Dee had jammed the electric rod clean through Korra's neck, penetrating through the other side, and then surging electricity through her body. She wrenched it back out and Korra's lifeless form hit the ground in a heap. Joo Dee took off after Long Feng as a cannon boomed, though her mouth was leaving a trail of blood that would lead right to their hideout, should they choose to search one out. Luckily for them, the Career Alliance was not about to hide. They were out to kill.

Bolin and Mako from districts 11 and 12 were quick to team up with each other, as Suki was dead, and Asami was nowhere to be found. She, Mai, and the tributes from District 3 had disappeared shortly after the gong had sounded, and it was only a matter of time before one of them showed up. They were suddenly knocked down by a rushing blast of flame. They spun around from the source where it had come, and realized that no one was there. After hearing screaming, the spun around and saw that it was Sokka. He dove into a nearby stream to put himself out, and upon resurfacing, he found himself face to face with Mako and Bolin.

"Truce," he asked sheepishly, knowing in his torched state and being outnumbered 2-to-1, that the odds were currently not in his favor.

"Give me one good reason," Mako challenged.

"Because 5 of the Careers have allied with each other, and recruited both tributes from District 6" he replied, "Basically, they're going to kill everyone that's not one of them."

"The alliance will have to end sooner or later though," Bolin argued, "but for now, I don't see a reason to leave you behind. The South Air Temple is just over there."

As they approached it, however, they realized that some ugly things were happening there. Ozai and Ursa had put aside their differences and were fighting against Tenzin, Asami, Zhao, and Toph, the latter two of which were infuriated by Ursa's early betrayal. Ozai had a white-hot flaming battleaxe, and Ursa was armed with electric flaming nunchucks. By the time Bolin, Mako, and Sokka reached the temple, most of it was in flames.

The Cornucopia Bloodbath was over, but the aftershock bloodbath was making its way through the remaining tributes. The reckless firebending from Ursa, Ozai, and Zhao was lightning more of the structure ablaze, and Toph's destructive earthbending was knocking it down even faster. It did not help that Asami was armed to the teeth with explosives of every kind, and had rigged the entire temple up even further with them (with the help of Tenzin's expertise) before the careers had arrived.

By the time the temple collapsed onto the 1st floor, leveling it and making the 2nd floor the new 1st floor, the fight had reached its zenith. Huge streams of flaming rock and metal were exchanging sides, and grenades and land mines were going off about every second. Some of them were not even Asami's doing, as the structures had been rigged by the gamemakers to start out with.

"I WILL BURNINATE YOU!" Ozai roared, continuing his roaring rampage of burning stuff. He jumped into the air and spewed mighty flames at Toph, his battleaxe in full swing. However, Toph was too quick, and evaded the attack. Her tactic was ultimately a setup to let Zhao disappear, reappear behind Ozai, and launch a massive fireball at him from point-blank range.

"AW YEAH," Zhao roared, "THE BURNINATOR GOT BURNINATED!"

Nothing was left of Ozai's upper half, and his legs crumpled to the floor in a burning heap as another cannon boomed.

Ursa was much harder to take down, given that she was not deranged the way her male counterpart was. She was calm and collected, and her reflexes rivaled those of Joo Dee. Even in a 4-on-1 situation she kept her cool, and she was able to badly hit Toph with a barrage of strikes from her nunchucks, which had devastating effects. Not only was her chest and arm burned, but the electricity surged through her body, paralyzing her left side. Given that her right arm was the burnt one, she was effectively out of commission. Zhao and Tenzin were too strong for Ursa to get past and finish the job, but this didn't faze her as she made her escape. She knew that once a tribute was injured, their chance of death increased dramatically—and Toph was one of the few that was going to be next.

* * *

**SURVIVORS:****  
**District 1: Ursa  
District 2: Zhao, Toph  
District 3: Tenzin, Lin  
District 4: Iroh, Jun  
District 5: Azula  
District 6: Long Feng, Joo Dee  
District 8: Sokka, Katara  
District 10: Mai  
District 11: Bolin  
District 12: Mako, Asami


	5. 05 The Death in the Night

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **this chapter marks the halfway point of the 79th Annual Hunger Games, and the end of Day 1.

**CHAPTER 5**

Sokka, Mako, and Bolin decided to put some distance between themselves and the South Air Temple. Racing through the forests alongside them, however, was a shadowy tribute. They knew that they were being followed, but didn't want to fight, and so continued running. Perhaps more frightening than knowing they were being followed, was them realizing that suddenly they were not being followed anymore, and right when the Southern Water Temple had come into view, no less. There was no way that the tracker had lost them in the sparser forest if he had been able to track them all the way through the thicker forest.

Whatever the case, they had made it to the Southern Water Temple, and with the exception of the effects from Sokka's fire, none of them were hurt. This, however, changed as they cautiously entered the temple to avoid the traps. Mako tripped and set off a fire trap, which also triggered an explosion. It was not enough to compromise the structural integrity of the building, but was definitely put Bolin and Sokka on edge. It was made worse after they noticed that Mako had not tripped. Someone had lodged a knife into the back of his neck. Seconds later, Bolin and Sokka found themselves face to face with Mai, the other tribute from District 10. She pulled out a set of knives, and Sokka pulled out his boomerang, while Bolin grabbed a large boulder.

The fight was on. Mai swung towards Bolin, but ended up hitting a wall of rock that she broke through. She was hit in the leg with Sokka's boomerang, which caused her to spin around long enough for Bolin to hit her in the back of the head with a rock and sent her sprawling. She sprung back up but was suddenly stopped dead in her tracks. A claw was in the back of her neck, and it was connected to a chain. It pulled back, ripping out the back of Mai's neck, where she crumpled dead. Lin appeared at the end of the chain, which she reeled back up using metalbending.

Sokka and Bolin prepared for another fight, this one more dangerous than the one they just finished. Bolin began by putting distance between him and Lin, with Sokka in hot pursuit.

"Wait up," he shouted; still a bit winded from the fire, "Lin will toast us if you don't!"

"I don't have to outrun Lin," he laughed, "I just have to outrun you!" Normally Bolin was not one to abandon his friends in such a manner, but that was the way the alliances in The Hunger Games worked out. Only one tribute could live, and so there eventually came a time when betrayal was inevitable.

Ursa's journey of attacking Career tributes continued, and her first strike was the North Air Temple where Iroh and Jun had holed themselves up. She blazed her way through, stopping at the Cornucopia to investigate the surroundings. It seemed the Gamemakers had done a few things to change it around.

Ursa noticed one of these changes right away, hopping right into one of said 'changes'

"And it looks like the tribute from District 1 has found the Mech Suit!" Kuruk announced, right around the same time that the cannon for Mai boomed.

Joo Dee was the first one to notice the approaching mecha, but she was heading straight southward to pick a fight with a couple of tributes that were trying to sneak out of the crumbling South Air Temple to reach the Fire Temple. Long Feng, who had been given charge of watching out for Jun while Iroh worked on fortifications and gathering supplies, also noticed it, but he did not alert Iroh as he had been instructed to. Instead, while Jun was asleep, he crept up to the roof with Iroh, insisting that he join him in the fortifications.

"And what of Jun," he raised his eyebrow,

"She said that she would be fine managing herself," Long Feng replied, "come now, you Careers are surely competent enough, even when hurt. She's a big girl."

"Woe to the liar then," Iroh nodded at him, "help me fortify this place if you value your life."

Ursa's mecha blasted straight through the walls of the temple, which, unfortunately for the District 4 Alliance, was close to where Jun lay incapacitated, and up till a few moments ago, asleep. The robotic arm reached out and grabbed Jun, but not before she had grabbed a spiked ball-and-chain and swung it towards Ursa's cockpit. It smashed the side of the glass, but Ursa was able to move her head before the spiked weapon smeared her brains on the opposite side of said cockpit. The mechanical arm that grabbed Jun proceeded to slam her against the wall, quite abruptly ending the duel. A cannon boomed.

Tenzin's swift cutting path to the Fire Temple led him past a trail of blood in the same direction. Considering that Joo Dee's jaw was still broken and bleeding, he had a feeling that it was she who was in the area. Unfortunately, he never found out, as someone popped up behind him, and had abruptly snapped his neck. She would have added her typical slogan of "The Earth King has invited you to a party at Lake Laogai, had her lower jaw not been broken and bleeding. It technically didn't make sense how Tenzin had gotten so quickly ambushed by Joo Dee, but that was what happened.

The first day of The 79th Annual Hunger Games was drawing to a close as the sun set over the arena. Another cannon boomed as Lin had caught up with Sokka and brought his life to an abrupt end by breaking his back, and now she and Bolin were chasing each other around the Southern Water Temple, neither one gaining an upper hand on the other. However, to Iroh, hearing three cannons go off so soon (by virtue of lucky, or perhaps unlucky, timing) near each other led him to believe that one of them could very well have been Jun's. A quick jump down a couple floors proved his theory correct, seeing evidence of a quick strike, and giant footprints, and no less, a mech suit heading back out a massive hole in the southern wall through which it had smashed. He spun around and confronted Long Feng.

"You abandoned her after the condition of watching her and us sparing your own life," he nodded at him, grabbing his shoulders, "Long Feng, you have called off the deal."

Without another word, Iroh blasted Long Feng in the face with a fireball, launching him through the gaping hole in the temple wall that Ursa's mecha had created. He hit the ground with a thud, and with another cannon boom, Iroh crossed his arms and gazed through the hole up at the darkening sky.

"so ends day one," he nodded, as if approvingly. "14 tributes down… 10 more to go."

* * *

**SURIVORS:**  
District 1: Ursa  
District 2: Zhao, Toph  
District 3: Lin  
District 4: Iroh  
District 5: Azula  
District 6: Joo Dee  
District 8: Katara  
District 11: Bolin  
District 12: Asami


	6. 06 Toph The Tribute Slayer

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **Chapter 6-not quite as big a bloodbath as chapter 5, but it's working up to it.

**CHAPTER 6**

Katara remained quietly perched in her tower as she listened to the destruction around her. Occasionally peeking her head out, she noticed that one of the tributes (Ursa) was in a giant mechanical suit, and she feared what this would mean for her. Hopefully one of the stronger tributes such as Toph, Iroh, or Zhao would take it out.

Evening fell, and there was silence in Katara's tower. She had found the supplies hidden within and avoided the traps that still burdened the structure. She clambered onto the roof to get a good look at the sky, and most notably, the hologram that would appear in it, showing the faces of the dead tributes from today's bloodbaths. Sure enough, they were shown within a few minutes of the sky going black…

Ozai, District 1; Tenzin, District 3; Jun, District 4; Zuko, District 5; Long Feng, District 6; Aang, District 7; Korra, District 7; Sokka, District 8; Haru, District 9; Ty Lee, District 9; Jet, District 10; Mai, District 10; Suki, District 11; Mako, District 12.

Katara almost felt bad for Districts 7, 9, and 10, given that they had all lost both of their tributes in day one. However, it was more of the sadness that was like forcing herself to feel bad when a kid in school died that she didn't know. She also noticed that both of the tributes from District 2 were still alive. It was not the first time it had happened, although in the 74th and 75th Hunger Games, Katara remembered that the Gamemakers had allowed two tributes to win if they were both from the same district. Why they did it two years in a row was beyond Katara, as she had only been 12 at the time of the 74th Hunger Games, and so only had one chance of being picked—which she had not been.

Luckily for the District 2 Alliance, they remained relatively unharmed after the fight in their area broke down. Toph's paralysis wore off, but her arm was still injured. Asami had been drafted in under the condition to "be useful or die", and she seemed to prefer "being useful". She was sent out of the crumbling temple to try to find something for Toph's arm after a few hours of swapping watch shifts with Zhao. Asami took no more than two steps out of the structure (dodging a rock which fell from the crumbling structure and landed where she had just been standing) when she took notice of a parachute. Apparently someone out there loved them.

She brought the package back in to Toph and Zhao, the former of which being to whom it was addressed. There was a note inside, which Asami read.

"_Make sure to tell Toph that I ain't gonna let her die that easily."_

It was signed by a man named who went by "King Bumi".

"Toph," she replied stepping back in, "King Bumi says he ain't gonna let you die that easily."

Toph laughed as Asami tossed her the package. She opened it and used the contents, which were salves and bandages, to dress and bind her arm. She did so without any assistance, and then there was silence as the tributes slept.

The next mrning, Toph woke up early and soon woke the others.

"It's back to killing time," she announced, and then turned to Zhao. "Head north." She ordered, "let's get rid of six and five. You take six, I'll take five."

"six" was in reference to the remaining District 6 Tribute, Joo Dee, while "five" was referring to Azula, the remaining District 5 Tribute.

"And what about me," Asami raised her eyebrows,

"You guard the fort," Zhao replied, "no one trusts the structural integrity of it any more than you do, and so there's a very slim chance that you'll get attacked."

Asami had no counterargument, and so Toph and Zhao set off, Toph heading east and Zhao heading north, the respective last directions they had seen their targeted tributes go in.

Incidentally, this move inspired the Gamemakers, who were watching their map and realizing that the Tributes were spread much too far apart. They started out with Azula, sending an explosion that demolished the entire northern half of her East Air Temple hideout, sending her westward, hopefully into Katara at the Water Tribe Tower. Azula, unaware of Katara's presence in the tower, headed right past it towards the fully intact Earth Kingdom Tower. She picked up her pace after one of Katara's ballista bolts nearly hit her. However, upon seeing Toph coming up from the south, she abandoned her plans to take the Fire Nation Tower, and jumped up in the Earth Kingdom Tower to see who had fired at her from the Water Tribe Tower.

It was Katara, and soon the two were exchanging shots, but they were not enough to damage each other's towers, although they were easily enough to destroy a tribute. They were only distracted when Ursa's mecha popped out of the northwest wall of the Fire Nation Tower, which began burning and would soon crumble. However, Toph also crossed paths with her, fighting her back with her now healing arm and her metalbending skills. Ursa, knowing that she wouldn't last more than 59 seconds in a mech suit against Toph or Lin, decided to run. Luckily for her, Toph chose not to pursue. Instead, she turned her power to the Earth Kingdom Tower, using bending to launch the assailant from the Earth Kingdom tower clean out. Azula landed painfully on her back, and the last thing she saw was a massive boulder coming and crashing down upon her. A cannon boomed.

"AWW YEAH!" she roared, "I'M-A CRUSHIN YOUR OPPOSITION!"

Unfortunately, Toph's victory period was short-lived. Asami ran up to her, warning her that Lin was after her, and that she had razed thee South Air Temple, which was already weak given its failing structural integrity. Unfortunately for Asami, Toph would have none of it.

"You're not very useful if you have to rely on me for protection," she replied, slowly turning towards Asami and giving her a signature death glare, "looks like it's time to "rock" this field."

Asami was not quite dead from the Death Glare, and so Toph finished the job the same way any red-blooded District 2 Tribute would when a death glare failed: She punched Asami in the throat. "AW YEAH!" she roared, as she always did when she killed a tribute, "LET'S GET READY TO RUMBLE!"

As if Toph had cued the Gamemakers, a loud rumbling was heard from the northwest where the Fire Temple was, and this attack on the temple caused most of it to collapse, forcing Joo Dee out and towards the center of the arena and the Cornucopia. The remaining tributes were converging, and if the rate of violence in Day 2 continued as fast as it was, the 79th Hunger Games would be over within a day.

* * *

**SURVIVORS:**  
District 1: Ursa  
District 2: Zhao, Toph  
District 3: Lin  
District 4: Iroh  
District 6: Joo Dee  
District 8: Katara  
District 11: Bolin


	7. 07 Happy Hunger Games

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:** by the end of this chapter, we will be down to the final 5 tributes.

**CHAPTER 7**

The Gamemakers swiftly became aware that this was going to be a very short hunger Games. However, the attention it garnered and the popularity it was enjoying in The Capitol meant that while it may not have been long (although was still obviously going), it would be replayed many, many times. It was only halfway through the 2nd day, and already 2/3 of the tributes were dead. This number was about to increase some more.

Lin charged through the debris from the crumbling Fire Tower. Utilizing some of the flaming chunks, Lin used her metal bales to sling some of them as fiery projectiles towards Iroh's North Air Temple to flush him out. Fortunately for her, flush him out it did. However, it was more from hearing three deafening explosions, one from the northeast, one from the southwest, and one from the southeast. It looked like the Gamemakers had blown up Earth Temple, the Southern Water Temple, and the Northern Water Temple, effectively also reducing the size of the arena. No one knew (or wanted to find out) what sort of perils were out there now.

Lin and Iroh commenced their duel, however. Lin's Cables proved superior, binding Iroh. However, the moment Lin stopped binding him and tried going for the kill, Iroh struck, heating his hands and melting them. This gave Lin white-hot weapons, but they were no match for what Iroh had found. There was a ballista, most likely fallen from the crumbling Fire Nation Tower, that neither of them had seen when the battle initially broke out. Iroh laughed it, adding a blast of his own fire to give it speed.

Lin failed to dodge it quickly enough, and it clipped her chest, impaling her and shooting her back against the wall of the Fire Nation Tower with enough force to bring it down. If the ballista bolt hadn't killed her, the tower's collapse had. Right as it collapsed on her, however, the cannon boomed, which led Iroh to believe that his ballista bolt had ultimately killed her. Satisfied, he returned to his retreat in the North Air Temple, waiting and watching the Cornucopia area strategically from his vantage point.

Zhao soon caught onto Joo Dee's path, and chased the bleeding-jawed woman towards the West Air Temple, leading all the way to the roof. The viciousness of Zhao, especially since he was a District 2 Tribute, meant that Joo Dee's fate was more or less sealed. Even injured, however, Joo Dee's reflexes were still useful, and she managed to outmaneuver Zhao for several minutes. However, as time passed, it was soon proven that reflexes can only do a person so good, and will not help them when they are Sparta-kicked off of the roof of a temple. Such was what happened to Joo Dee, courtesy of Zhao.

"AW YEAH!" he roared, "THIS IS DISTRICT 2!" he beat his chest triumphantly and decided to hole himself up in this temple for a bit. He'd meet up with Toph here and then they would take control of the Cornucopia and ideally, the surrounding area.

Things near the Cornucopia hadn't changed too much at first though. While Ursa continued romping through the field in her mech suit, Katara was able to make a break for the Earth Kingdom Tower, which, while still full of untouched traps, was in better structural condition than the Water Tribe Tower, and moreover, did not have a tracker-jacker nest in it. Clearly the Gamemakers had seen her sitting in the tower for too long and wanted her to move.

She started shooting ballista bolts towards the tower, incurring the anger of said tracker-jackers. There was no sentiment between her and her trusty Water Tribe Tower other than the fact that Bolin was heading for it, and she wanted him out of the question. Bolin was quick to answer the tracker-jacker issue though, bending a rock to crush the main nest. The few that escaped were after him, but he constructed a large rock suit around himself, including over his eyes. The remaining insects attacked it, but their stings did not get through the rock. It was time to play the waiting game.

As Katara waited, however, a parachute came her way. It was long and thin, but heavy. She took it, opening the package and reading the note.

"Let them eat lead." It read, and there was no telling who it was from owing to the lack of a signature. Katara opened the package to find a fully loaded sniper rifle. She knew exactly what to do with it.

A few moments later, the back half of Bolin's neck disappeared as Katara locked and reloaded. Granted, he wasn't so much the problem, and neither were the few remaining tracker-jackers at the foot of the Water Tribe tower. Now it was a swarm of buzzard-wasps. A cannon was not the only thing that boomed after Bolin's death. The air was soon filled with the sound of Katara's sniper rifle, as well as the guns from Ursa's mech suit. Either she had found another tribute to blast into three months ago, or she was dealing with some other mutt the Gamemakers had spawned.

Ursa was dealing with giant versions of the tracker-jackers, which seemed to be some sort of mutation between them and dragons, so these things were absolutely gnarly. However, they were no match for Ursa's arm-cannon, which obliterated them effortlessly with its lasers. Deciding, however, that she needed more information on the state of the arena, she activated the hover ability on the mech suit and launched into the sky. She discovered that the size of the Arena had been vastly reduced. Everything within 100 yards of the outer boundaries of the four Air Temples was gone. She contemplating abusing the abilities of her mech suit and remaining in the air, but then realized that she would still have to come down to kill the 2nd-to-last remaining tribute even if she did. She decided against that, and instead came crashing down near the smoldering ruins of the north end of the East Air Temple.

Ursa's mindset was one that involved realizing that both tributes from District 2 were still alive, and if The Capitol decided to play another rule change, that they would stay back-to back.

Almost as if her thought had summoned the Gamemakers, they spoke.

"Attention Tributes," they announced, "the rule change from the 74th and 75th Hunger Games is now in effect again. Two tributes may win if they are from the same district—Happy Hunger Games!"

Ursa rolled her eyes. As predicted, Toph and Zhao immediately made their way to converge. While Ursa was not there to see it, she knew it was happening. However, not more than 5 minutes after the announcement, the Gamemakers spoke yet again.

"Attention Tributes—about the earlier rule change: we were just kidding. There will only be one winner again this year—Happy Hunger Games!"

Ursa grinned, and continued her course anyways. Toph and Zhao were going down.

* * *

**SURVIVORS:**  
District 1: Ursa  
District 2: Zhao, Toph  
District 4: Iroh  
District 8: Katara


	8. 08 Concerning Career Tributes

**AUTHOR'S NOTES**: As the Games come to a close, the number of tributes continues to narrow. 2 more die in this chapter.

**CHAPTER 8**

Ursa wanted to exploit Toph and Zhao while they were together, but she didn't know how long their alliance would last. While she was closer to Katara, she wanted a little more protection around her head than the glass dome of the mech-suit. She had come across Bolin's corpse before the hovercraft had taken it, and she recognized the effects of a sniper victim when she saw them.

She decided that it would be a good time to exterminate Iroh, or at least get him to help her wipe out the alliance between Zhao and Toph. Besides, Toph and Zhao were towards the West Air Temple, while Iroh was also westward. It was on her way anyways. Cutting northward would also keep her from Katara's sniper shots.

As she passed only about 50 yards from the Cornucopia, she paused. She was Ursa, the female tribute of District 1. She was no coward. It was time to take down Katara. She turned left, heading south, towards the Earth Kingdom Tower where she knew Katara was perched. She lifted the mecha's right arm, launching several missiles at the base of the tower. They hit, blasting most of the northeast corner off. Katara was exposed for one brief second, where she shot the shoulder joint of the mech suit so precisely that it made some inner working explode, taking the arm with it. It knocked the remaining parts of the mechanical marvel over, ejecting Ursa in the process.

Ursa, realizing that she was vulnerable, took cover towards the Cornucopia, in hopes of getting out of Katara's sniper range. Either it had some insane range; Katara was a skill-shot, or worse yet, possibly both. She was relieved after not hearing Katara's sniper shots hit anywhere near her or on her, and was pleased to find that there was at least one other mech suit placed near the Cornucopia. She put it to some good use, and made her way to the West Air Temple. She gained confidence after realizing that it was made by The Capitol's Future Industries, which meant the metal was of a pure enough quality that it could not be metalbent.

Ursa gave the temple her greeting by blasting a series of missiles near the southern end that reduced a huge strip of the temple to rubble. Luckily for Toph and Zhao, they were not there, and so soon the two of them popped out, ready for a fight. Ursa held out, but Toph and Zhao were incredibly powerful. The mech-suit was a good piece of armor, but Ursa wanted it against Iroh and at least as a shell against Katara's sure-shot sniping skills. She ejected, launching herself into the air. Her firebending skills were greater than Zhao's, but Toph proved to be a consistent menace. She could likely take them out if she could pick off one of them. She used her firebending to keep herself airborne, and while one hand kept her there, her other spewed streams of flames at Zhao. He countered with a giant dragon made of fire, which soon took the battle between the two firebender to the skies.

Toph's lack of eyesight as well as her inability to sense airborne objects rendered her useless to help Zhao, but at the same time, she figured that he would be able to manage it herself. She slunk back into the remains of the temple, rigging it up for Ursa's return.

Back in the air, Ursa and Zhao were having an Agni Kai in the sky, more or less. Flames from Zhao's dragon launched in a stream towards where Ursa's solitary figure hovered, but she was swift at dodging it, and the mighty dragon was slow to maneuver, albeit overwhelmingly powerful. He shot a blast down at the ground towards Iroh's North Air Temple, but missed him completely although he did set a portion of the temple on fire. Iroh made quick work of it, but had already started slinking towards the Cornucopia. However, Zhao's distraction would cost him. Ursa exploited that split-second by seizing control of Zhao's fire-dragon, making it throw him off. She crushed the dragon into a bolt of fire, launching each of these bolts at Zhao. Ursa let herself plummet, and right as she landed, a cannon boomed. Zhao was gone.

Toph was aware of this, however, and met Ursa immediately, and the two dueled on the steps of the West Air temple. Ursa was fighting swiftly and fiercely, hoping to monopolize the mech suits and prevent having to allow a mech-suit duel between Iroh and whoever else got the other one, between her and Toph, anyways. Ideally, monopolizing on them all was her hope, but she knew she had made a mistake not destroying the other one.

With Toph it was a matter of fighting to the death with rock and fire. Ursa lacked the raw power that Ozai and Zhao had had, but she had a certain finesse to her that made the battle between her and Toph extremely fast-paced. Ursa's hits on Toph were small, but were cuts in places that would drain blood rather fast. This would ultimately lead to Toph's demise.

Granted, Toph was the last person that would ever go down without a fight. Rocks peppered with her own blood from the cuts Ursa had given her were launched continuously towards Ursa, a few finding their marks, one dislocating her shoulder and another breaking her ankle. However, Ursa still managed to avoid Toph's attacks. She bucked up and was able to slam herself against a rock to put her shoulder back into place, and she used the same firebending-based flying to avoid having to step on her broken ankle. Time took Ursa's side, as soon Toph collapsed from loss of blood, and another cannon boomed.

Ursa's objective was clear now—get to a mech suit, or die trying. Her lack of speed would put her in a very vulnerable position if she tried approaching Katara, and she assumed that since she had just killed Toph and Zhao, that Iroh was still unhurt.

She was able to recover her mech suit, and she stormed towards the Cornucopia in hopes that she would reach it before Iroh found out that there was another mech suit there. She certainly regretted not destroying one of them earlier. As she approached the Cornucopia, however, there was no sign of Iroh from the north. Perhaps he had the same idea as Ursa, and wanted to pick off Katara first.

This did not seem to be the case, however. As the Cornucopia and what was left of the two standing turrets came into view, so did Iroh, armed with the other mech suit. For a brief moment, there was silence in the arena. "The Titans" of the 79th Annual Hunger Games were about to face off.

* * *

**SURVIVORS:**  
District 1: Ursa  
District 4: Iroh  
District 8: Katara


	9. 09 The Titans

**AUTHOR'S** **NOTES: **The next chapter ends the 79th Hunger Games. May the odds ever be in your character's favor.**  
**

**CHAPTER 9**

As Ursa and Iroh prepared to face off in the mech-suits, the sky finally finished darkening for the night, and Katara used the darkness and distraction to slink back into the Water Turret. The holograms of the dead tributes began showing up, and there were naturally slightly fewer of them this time than there had been last time: Zhao, District 2; Toph, District 2; Lin, District 3; Azula, District 5; Joo Dee, District 6; Bolin, District 11; Asami, District 12.

Katara was well-aware that it was down to her, as the last representative from District 8. She had to face Ursa of District 1 and Iroh of District 4 if she wanted to win, and here she was cooped up in a crumbling tower with little more than her speed and her sniper rifle to protect her against two Career Tributes. She just had to hope that they would kill each other and that she'd somehow be able to overpower the remaining one.

Luckily it seemed that they wanted to take each other down before handling Katara. Given that both of them had tied for the 2nd highest danger score (12 out of 12; only Toph ousted them by somehow getting a 13 out of 12), they were pretty sure they could lay some smackdown on a girl who only got an 8. Katara's only real threat was her sniping skills.

The two careers made the metal machines more or less have a boxing match at first, with each one trying to slam the other with a fistful of metal. Through the plexiglass of the cockpits, they grinned evilly at each other as they tried to punch the living daylights out of the other's mech suit. Katara watched the events unfold from the safety of her turret. As long as those tracker-jackers didn't come back, she would be fine unless they decided to pick her off as a team.

However, it anything, they seemed to be fighting over who got to kill Katara. Both of them wanted the kill, but neither one wanted to try and risk it when the other was still alive. It was a logical maneuver ultimately, as Ursa would have no qualms against backstabbing Iroh, nor would Iroh have any against backstabbing Ursa given the chance.

Iroh started to channel his firebending through the guns of his mech suit, adding some blazing flames to the mix. Ursa responded in kind, and soon there were two giant hunks of metal jumping around and shooting flames at each other.

"Metal firebenders," one of the Gamemakers commented, "what *will* they think of next?"

The Gamemakers had actually been about to add a little bit of spice to the games, but it seemed that the crowds, including many of those from the districts (according to reports from local Peacekeepers), were watching this fight with utmost interest. Among The Capitol, more bets were being placed, and some who had already lost money on tributes who had fallen were putting more money in on some of the survivors. Both Iroh and Ursa were given the odds of 10/23, while Katara had 3/23. The Hunger Games were definitely a lucrative business in The Capitol.

Dazzling displays of fire and lightning filled the night as the two Careers duked it out. Both tributes were masters of their art, both in offense and defense, and so for each powerful attack they launched, they countered with a good defense. The mech suits also definitely helped in the defense part. It remained an impressive display, as Katara, The Capitol, and the districts watched their dance. Katara, however, was the first one to notice a pattern in their steps. They were moving towards the Earth Turret, or what was left of it, anyhow. Katara watched their movements, but in the mech suits, it was even hard for the Gamemakers to tell exactly what they were up to.

Suddenly it became very clear. As if they had timed it, both Ursa and Iroh simultaneously spun around, launching their missiles into the turret, demolishing it. There was a pause, as if they were waiting for a cannon to boom. However, since no tribute had died, no cannon boomed, which also meant that Katara was either not in the tower, or she had some impeccable survival skills to be able to survive a structure crashing down on top of her.

There was still some natural distrust between Ursa and Iroh, for even if they were to form an alliance it would be extremely short-lived, given that after Katara's death they would be forced to duke it out to determine the victor of the 79th Annual Hunger Games. Thus, their dance continued as they slowly migrated to the Water Turret.

Katara was not ready to sit down and die though, and so she loaded her sniper rifle and pointed it between the two fighting mech-suits, waiting for a good opening to snipe one, and hopefully snipe the other before he or she could get in close enough range to shoot her out of the tower. However, she had no need. Ursa finally gained the upper hand by landing a well-aimed channeled electrified missile towards Iroh's mecha, hitting it where the crotch would be on a person. This damaged some of the core joints and mechanisms on the legs, causing it to collapse and buckle.

Iroh ejected, unhurt and unfazed. He channeled flames into the metal of Ursa's mecha, heating it up. It was able to withstand the heat enough not to melt, but Ursa could not shake him, and the temperature inside the cockpit slowly started turning into an oven, Ursa's skin turning red and drenched in sweat. Iroh's fury was not to be matched, even by her, and she knew that if she ejected from the mecha, that he would have the advantage. She frantically attacked the controls, trying to get the machine to take out Iroh. She most likely only had seconds to pull it off.

The odds were in her favor. One of her mecha's hands locked around Iroh, and flung him towards the Water Turret with enough force that he did not survive the collision. He slammed against the structure, and slumped to the ground, motionless. A cannon boomed, and a hologram that read "Iroh, District 4" complete with his portrait, appeared in the sky. The instant Ursa's mecha had flung Iroh, she ejected, throwing herself out into the fresh, cool air, breathing heavily. She glanced up at the Water Turret, (which at this point was the only one of the four turrets left standing) and then rolled behind her mecha in case Katara shot at her. She waited a few minutes, and Katara's own inaction worked against her. Soon the mechanical marvel was cool enough that it wouldn't cook Ursa like an oven, and therefore, she was back inside, heading for Katara's turret. It was down to the final two.

* * *

**SURVIVORS:**  
District 1: Ursa  
District 8: Katara


	10. 10 And the Winner Is

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **and thus ends the 79th Annual Hunger Games in an extra-length chapter. From here on out, there is much more crossing over.

**CHAPTER 10**

Katara had waited for Ursa to jump back into the mecha because her mobility was much more limited in there, which meant she would have a better shot at blasting Ursa's brains out the other side of her head. In fact, this was exactly what happened.

Or rather, that was exactly what would have happened if Katara were in charge. She shot towards Ursa, but Ursa had reacted fast enough that a giant missile had gotten between Ursa's face and Katara's sniper rifle as it screamed towards the latter. It triggered a rather large explosion in the air, which clouded Katara's vision. Ursa shot another missile, which Katara blindly shot at as well. It only made yet another explosion, which in all truths just added to the effect of the growing awesomeness that was ensuing around the Water Turret. The stakes were high, and millions of yuans had been placed as bets on the two tributes.

To add to the effect, the Gamemakers triggered a lightning storm in the area around them, rain pouring down, but not before setting some areas around them in flames. Surprisingly, the Water Turret itself was not ablaze, but it was clear what else was going on and what the Gamemakers were aiming for. They wanted a duel between water and fire.

However, before that could happen, Katara would need to lose her sniper rifle, and Ursa would need to lose her mech suit. They continued to fight, Katara's swiftness on her feet being too much for the career tribute's mech suit, and Ursa's mech suit being too strong and moving too swiftly (which said something, given its slowness) for the District 8 girl to get a good shot at a weak point in. Katara was from a district that specialized in textiles, not weaponry, and only the Peacekeepers ever used firearms, and so she had no real skill when she had a moving target and had to stay on the move herself. However, she was not completely dumb in her know-how. She knew how to use the weapon, as she had demonstrated earlier.

Eventually, she decided to go back to old-fashioned bending, though she slung the sniper rifle over her back so she wouldn't lose it to the darkness or worse, to Ursa. She slung water over the top of the mech suit in attempt to drop it down some of the exhaust vents, but Ursa reacted too quickly, spring out, and using a powerful blast of firebending to turn it to steam.

The battle of the two benders proved to be a more interesting watch, and the citizenry of the Capitol were more on edge about it. It was making a more interesting show.

Ursa grabbed flames from the burning areas as Katara whipped up some of the rain and groundwater to counterattack. Both added fire and water of their own into the mix, and it became clear that while Katara was not a Career Tribute, that her skills in waterbending were difficult to top. However, Ursa's firebending was nothing to sneeze at either, and even with the rain, she proved to be a deadly threat that was gaining an advantage on Katara. Ursa was swift on her feet and launching massive fireballs towards Katara. She fought very much like Ozai had, except that Ozai's attacks were much more powerful and much less well-placed. Ursa had a healthier balance between power and precision, both of which were high. Katara's own reflexes and the natural fact that water put out fire was what was saving her hide at the moment.

The bending battle that took place between the two tributes lasted for what seemed like hours, with neither one able to overtake the other. Ursa threw lightning into the mix every now and again, but Katara brought up walls of ice which shattered. The moment they did, Katara blocked a few incoming projectiles with the armored bands that were over her gloves, and used her powerful feet to shoot the remaining shards back at Ursa. Grey and black Water Tribe warrior outfits with the tribute's district number emblazoned on the shoulders, had been the outfit theme of the 79th Annual Hunger Games, and Katara exploited her familiarity with them, by knowing how much the steel platings on her gloves and boots could handle, and knowing when to block with them and when to block with bending.

There was a moment when Ursa took control of Katara by effectively 'juggling' her with firebending, hitting her with consecutive strikes, and keeping her from ever hitting the ground. After a particularly violent strike, Katara was launched high into the air for long enough that she whipped out her sniper rifle, spund around, and took aim. She shot, but in the blackness, all she could see were the dying flames on the ground, and Ursa's next fireball streaking towards her. She shot blindly into it, hoping she'd hit Ursa. A second later, she heard a scream. The good news for her meant that Ursa had been hit; the bad news was that if she could scream, she was still alive. Either way, she was falling at the moment, and it was going to hurt—a lot.

Ursa watched as Katara landed on the ground with a painful-sounding crunch. Using fire to boost her speed, Ursa blazed her way over to where Katara lay in agony, and prepared to finish her off. She wasn't sure what Katara had broken, but the deed had to be done. She lunged forward and was not surprised to find that Katara was on her feet ready to counterattack. So perhaps she was a little surprised, but given the way fate twisted and turned things, it shouldn't have been that surprising.

"Come now," Kuruk commented, "fate totally plays cards like that. The fact that the District 1 girl didn't overheat in the mech suit was no coincidence either."

"So effectively, you're just evening the field." Yangchen nodded. "It's a clever tactic. I approve."

Ursa launched herself backwards and hopped back into her mecha. Katara seemed to disappear back into the shadows, and so Ursa began firing missiles in the general direction she saw Katara in. she heard light screaming from outside, drowned out by her missiles exploding and by the interior of the metal marvel she was in. she patted her chest, which was also covered by a thick, bulletproof vest given to her by a sponsor, and continued her charge. She shot another missile and in the explosion, the window of her mecha splattered with water and blood. In the moment that she paused to listen for the cannon that was supposed to go off, however, there was a loud "POW!" as something hit the machine in the chest with a well-aimed bullet.

For a moment, Ursa thought it had ricocheted, but a moment later, she heard a crackling noise, and knew that it was bad. She slammed the eject button, but the controls were jammed enough that it slowed down the ejection process. Smaller explosions were heard which grew in size, until the whole thing suddenly exploded, blasting Ursa cleanly out of it, where she was launched into the air, and fell with a crunch. The sniper from the shadows, who was obviously Katara, stepped up to see if Ursa was truly dead or not. Her weapon was loaded, and she was ready to shoot if she saw any signs of movement. In fact, she was ready to shoot the motionless tribute's body.

The storms receded, the rain slowing to a drizzle. As it got brighter, Katara realized just how much damage they had done. Remarkably, the Water Turret was still standing, as if a beacon to the waterbender who seemingly had won the match. The skies, however were still a dark grey, and the rain had not stopped, nor had Ursa moved. So where was the cannon?

Katara peered down into Ursa's glazed eyes. Suddenly, something moved and she shrieked so loudly that she staggered backwards and dropped her gun. A second later when she regained herself, Ursa was still lying motionless, and a mockingjay was seen flying overhead. Had that really been what had scared her? She pulled herself to her feet, looking around, and wiping some blood out of her eyes.

Then she heard it. The cannon boomed, and a fiery image of Ursa's profile as well as "Ursa, District 1" appeared in the dark grey skies above her. A moment later, it vanished.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," the announcer boomed, "May I present to you… the winner… of the 79th Annual Hunger Games!"

The grey skies were soon populated with another fiery image, this one of Katara, and reading "Katara, District 8" underneath it. Seconds later, the word "VICTOR" fizzled into view beneath it.

"Well-played joke, 3," Roku nodded at a young airbender who had brought the bird out to scare Katara as a last-shot piece of show. "they were right about you being a good Gamemaker."

"It's part of the business." She shrugged in return. "I do what I have to in order to make a great game. Great games become great, memorable shows."

"Your design of the arena was spectacular as well." Kyoshi smirked, "I loved the design."

Katara was unaware of all of this conversation between Gamemakers though. All she knew—and cared about—for the moment, was that the 79th Annual Hunger Games were finally over, and that she was the victor.

* * *

**VICTOR:**  
Katara, District 8


	11. 11 Out From the Past

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **back to standard-length chapters, and now that the Games are over for the time being, enter in some crossing over.

**CHAPTER 11**

The recollection of what happened next was a bit hazy for Katara. She had weird dreams of the tributes she met and fought on the 79th Battlefield, and thought back to her own trip here, the Capitol itself, and some of the other victors from past games that she had seen alongside Sokka, her brother and district counterpart. She remembered watching several Hunger Games in preparation for her own, and several stuck out to her.

There was one, somewhere around the 28th Hunger Games or so, where a girl from district 4 named Kya had won her tournament by triggering an enormous tsunami that rode dangerously near the wall of the electric forcefield. She rode right over most of the tributes, and had then slung the water against the electrified wall, frying the survivors. The girl had the same name Katara's mother did, but they were not the same person. This game was the one Katara remembered when watching the 70th Hunger Games, when a girl who was also from District 4 won her games after the Arena flooded.

On the note of wily female tributes from District 4, there was Mags, a lady even older than Kya considering the order of the Hunger Games that she had won. In fact, she had probably been Kya's mentor. Her victory wasn't as memorable as Kya's or even Annie's, but if she was still alive, Katara wanted to meet her. Her own mentor, Hama, who won by exploiting the strongest tributes under a full moon by bloodbending them, had been considerably deranged. She wondered if all mentors had been like that. Hama was so old, that she had been alive before the Hunger Games had even started, being the victor of the 2nd Annual Hunger Games.

Then there were the 74th and 75th Hunger Games, where two victors won each of them, since they were from the same district. The victors of Game 74 were a pair of brutal, ruthless tributes from District 2 who exploited that rule from the moment they heard it, and they proceeded to utterly dominate each and every other tribute that had survived the Cornucopia bloodbath, tearing a bloody swathing path through the arena, leaving utter destruction in their wake. At the end, the two tributes, Clove and Cato, used a combination of firebending and earthbending to make a volcano erupt in the area, just to show how freaking awesome they were. It was one hell of a show. Katara remembered liking that game, and it had also reminded her to watch out for the Career Tributes, particularly those from District 2. Cato and Clove definitely had had the same mindset that Toph and Zhao had had during the game. A lot of the memorable tributes had apparently volunteered, and these two were said to have choked a couple of other kids in order to volunteer.

Then there were the victors of the 75th Hunger Games, which was apparently supposed to be a Quarter Quell, but the requirements for the rule change could not be met that year, and so they had put it off—indefinitely. It seemed to be a fear tactic—a reminder to the districts that not even the greatest of them could predict the ways of The Capitol. The victors of those games, however, were arguably fiercer than the victors of the previous ones. The boy, a waterbender named Gale Hawthorne, had an "any means necessary" attitude and was a ruthless fighter in the game. What surprised Katara—as well as most Capitol Citizens—that year was that he was a more deadly opponent than most of the Career Tributes, a few of which he personally annihilated.

The girl that year was even worse. A fierce, ruthless firebender with a really bad attitude, this Katniss Everdeen tore up the arena, almost literally. The Gamemakers had given her a Training Score of 12 without hesitation, and it was after the 75th Hunger Games that the Training Scores became known for indicating tributes to watch out for instead of go for, because Katniss had lived up to that 12 in every way possible. It was her district number, her training score, and was even the number of tributes that she singlehandedly destroyed. The fact that both of these tributes were from District 12, known for being the laughingstock of Panem, was enough to strike fear into the hearts of many, and the only other Tribute in Hunger Games history to get a higher score was Toph of District 2 during the 79th Games, who somehow got a 13 out of 12.

Katara remembered that story well, in fact. Apparently the Gamemakers thought that a 15-year-old blind girl was not going to be a threat, and so they paid her little attention until she had punched the ground so hard that the building almost came down on top of them. Before any of them could react, however, she slid her feet and thrust her arms back out, sealing all the cracks and putting the building back exactly how it had been. With a crack of her knuckles she replied, "Who's next?" and strode out.

Other than a man named Haymitch who exploited the forcefield around the arena to deflect another girl's ax back into her skull and win himself a Games, the most interesting match Katara remembered was the 77th Hunger Games, where a little 12-year-old airbender girl from District 3, whose Training Score was only a 4, had figured out the ins and outs of the technologies implanted in the arena. The Careers recruited her, and they ravaged the field until it was just them. When they were about to kill her for a lack of use, she pulled out an Equalist glove and shocked several metallic rods she had set around their camp, effectively frying 6 kids at once, and securing her victory in a manner of seconds.

Katara's victor's interview was nothing of note. She rambled a little bit about how it was a matter of knowing when to move your piece instead of worrying about its power, which was how she was able to evade the most powerful tributes, and personally kill one of the most powerful Careers. She was glad that she had won, but as it did to everyone, The Hunger Games had left Katara a changed woman, and not just because she was about to live a new life in the Capitol's Victor Village. The recent consolidation of Victor's Villages from the districts to the Capitol itself was a new change, and Katara had a feeling that it and the "mixing things up" that had happened in Games 74-79, were connected events. Perhaps she'd ask the other victors about that when she met them.


	12. 12 Welcome to the Victors Village

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **the next couple of chapters are more 'filler' material as the setting gets constructed and whatnot. It also serves as character setup.

**CHAPTER 12**

Katara learned that she was going to be relocated to a shadier part of town that was technically not even part of The Capitol, known as The Victor's Village. Up until recently, there were 12 of these—one in each district, but The Capitol decided to consolidate them all into one place where they would be easy to keep track of, and would be close to The Capitol. Capitol Citizens simply called it "The Republic District", and while it was an utterly unimpressive place compared to the rest of the Capitol, it was still significantly better living than the Districts, including the wealthiest, District 1.

The Republic District was not solely inhabited by the 80 or so tributes that had won previous games, but also by "lesser" Capitol Citizens or other such people, and it seemed to be some type of punishment for whatever the folks at The Capitol thought was a crime. To any of the Victors, getting a slightly reduced standard of living from "indescribably fantastic" to simply "really good" was somewhat of a joke, but The Capitol citizens took it seriously. Whatever the case, Katara wasn't complaining, but the recent trauma from the games themselves was still wearing on her mind.

She decided to resolve the problem the way most adults from District 8 (or any other district for that matter) would when the going got tough, which was often—she needed a drink.

There were a surprising number of bars in The Republic District—it seemed that drinking was a popular pastime of the victors, and the more Katara thought about it, the more she could understand why. She swung into a place unnervingly called "_The Bleeding Tribute_" which had a picture of a girl clenching her chest on the front, which was naturally red. What a creepy impression to leave on kids. Hopefully, however, she could met some people and learn a bit more about them and this place as well.

Upon entering, she saw a couple of tributes she had recognized from past games, including the victor of the 78th Hunger Games, a District 5 boy who was drinking his money away at the bar. A couple of stools away was an older girl who was hunched over. Katara could not tell who this was. At least three older tributes (they may not even had all been tributes), all male, were sitting in a corner table, shooting dice, while a fourth man was sitting on his own, downing bottle after bottle of some kind of drink.

"Katara," a voice called out, "nice to see you here."

Katara spun around and saw the little Airbender from the 77th Hunger Games. She invited Katara to sit at her table, and Katara accepted the invitation. Of the victors, she looked the least likely to tear her head off simply for getting too close.

"My name's Ikki," she grinned, "you're the new blood here, aren't you?"

"I thought that was obvious," Katara shrugged, "but I guess I should ask if there is anything I should know about this place other than to avoid victors."

"Oh, they're not that bad. Who was your mentor? Was it Woof? Was it Cecilia? Was it HAMA!"

She paused for a split-second, her mind and mouth racing a mile a minute. "It was Hama, wasn't it? Oooh, she's creepy!"

"Ikki!" Katara snapped, "Slow down, bub. I need to know what to watch out for."

Ikki chuckled. "Okay, well, there's really not much. Just make sure not to piss off Katniss or spill her drinks." She motioned towards the girl at the bar, "actually, she might be one to avoid altogether."

"Why's that?" Katara raised her eyebrow.

"She's got three moods," Ikki giggled, "Angry, Furious, and Enraged. Right now she's angry, which is her safest mood as you probably figured."

Katniss' form slumped, which meant she most likely sunk her head into her arms.

"Anyways," Ikki continued, "other than that there's not much to avoid here. If you want to wait a few minutes for a couple of friends of mine, you can be our 4th for Bridge. That reminds me—don't play card games with Katniss, because she cheats, and she usually sets something on fire if she loses."

"Noted," Katara nodded, "long story short, Katniss is a dangerous woman who likes solving her problems with fire, tanks, and explosions. Sounds a lot like the District 2 tributes I dealt with this year."

Ikki just chuckled. A few minutes later, a boy and a girl stepped in, the girl's foot still in the air from where she had kicked the door open.

"Ikki!" she called out, grinning evilly from ear to ear, "Did you find a better 4th this time? I am NOT going to play with Katniss again and get into another Agni Kai… unless one of us dies."

Ikki raised her eyebrows, "no Cato this time, Clove?"

"No Katniss this time, Ikki." She replied bluntly.

"Relax," Ikki giggled, "I got the new girl from 8. Sit down; grab a beer—it's on me."

"Gale subbed for Cato this time," Clove indicated the other boy, who already spun a chair around and sat in it, popping open a bottle and draining it. "Cato jumped into an Earth Rumble again."

"Well," Ikki raised her eyebrows, "that would have been fun to watch. Oh! Intros! Katara, this is Clove and Gale. Clove, Gale… Katara."

Katara waved sheepishly. Gale nodded to acknowledge her presence, and Clove simply raised an eyebrow in a way that didn't give the impression that she wanted Katara dead, which she found relieving. Ikki glanced from Katara to the others, and then pulled out some cards.

Halfway through their 5th game, a noise outside the usual batch of commotion occurred. Katniss had banged her fist on the counter and shouted: "I NEED A GOOD STROOOOOONG DRINK!"

"I'd give her a drink if I could bash it over her head," Clove murmured, but apparently Katniss had slammed money onto the table, because soon she was back to drinking, and seemed to quiet down for the moment, going back from furious to simply angry. She shook the bottle to throw some of the liquid into the air. With a flick of her fingers, she set it on fire, and then watched it arch up. Katniss caught it in her mouth, swallowing effortlessly, belching loudly, and slumping back down.

"So what's her problem?" she raised an eyebrow. Both Clove and Gale looked ready to scream the answer, but Ikki held up a hand as both of their mouths opened.

"Let me tell her, guys," She replied sweetly, "to put it simply, everyone here, including me, has some form of PTSD. Some have it worse than others, but it affects everyone. You can be 20," she glanced at Clove, "23," she glanced at Gale, "17" she glanced at Katara, "14" she nodded at herself, "or 21" she glanced over at Katniss, "but it's there. It doesn't mean they're justified, it just explains why they do what they do. You'll figure it out soon enough."

"I guess I will then." Katara simply shrugged, as she picked up her cards and began another game.


	13. 13 The Lay of the Land, Part 1

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:** some more worldbuilding and a bit of 'filler', so to speak. You might call this the first half of one chapter, as the next chapter or two also cover this sort of thing.

**CHAPTER 13**

As Katara expected, several things happened at the bar that night—she got a little tipsy, she learned a little bit about some of the past tributes, especially Gale, Clove, and Ikki, the latter two of which invited Katara for some Hearts tournaments every Tuesday starting at 6, and more importantly, learned a bit more about the workings of The Capitol. As long as she did not say anything bad about the place, or anything that sounded like anything shy of total loyalty to The Capitol, they would leave her alone. Gale mentioned that it was easier to slip under the radar as long as they lingered in the Republic District.

It didn't seem too hard, nor did going to the city proper every now and again, which was another of the many things Ikki explained to Katara. The victors occasionally received such invitations, though there did not seem to be a pattern to them, nor did more than one or two victors get summoned at one time. Gale mentioned that Ikki had gotten summoned roughly 3 times a week, while Clove chipped in that she had only been summoned once each year.

Katara and Clove swung by what was revealed to be an Earth Rumble Arena, where they caught the last few minutes of one of Cato's matches, where he blasted another guy out of the ring with a massive rock fist. Upon winning, he raised said fist into the air and shouted "KILL YOUR ENEMIES—IN THE FACE!"

His opponent was not dead, but he had a good-sized bump developing on his head. Those who watched these tournaments in the Republic District were gamblers. It was not much different from The Hunger Games, and even had a nice feel to it because many victors had been earthbenders, and participated in these games.

For those who weren't earthbenders, there was the Probending ring on the edge of town near the river, but it was much more heavily monitored, perhaps because of its proximity to the wilderness. Whatever the case, these tournaments were much more like The Hunger Games, except that actual killing was not allowed—even the lowliest Capitol Citizens loved their victors, and The Capitol proper would not be pleased with Victor's Village if one of them died. These were some highlights of the city's description that took Katara's interest, but she was still curious about so many of the people here.

After the Earth Rumble had ended, Cato joined Clove and Katara on the way home.

"I've got an Agni Kai to get to at 9:45, so I'm splitting in a few moments," Clove remarked, "funny how much division there is in the Triads."

"Triads," Katara looked at Cato, hoping he'd answer her question

"They pretty much run Republic," he shrugged, "join them, beat the crap out of people, what's not to like? You'll end up killing yourself soon enough if you don't, anyways."

Katara decided to end her string of questions there, and Cato split up again anyways. Clove only stayed a few more minutes before she split to meet up with the man she was going to duel. Katara was left alone on the dark streets, which didn't bother her too much. So this was her life in the big city. She glanced to the north and saw the even brighter lights of the exotic Capitol city. It was surprisingly quiet for most of her walk, but soon she heard a familiar voice calling out her name.

"There you are, Katara," the girl smiled after appearing at her side. It was Ikki.

"How did you get here so fast? She gawked, "it was completely silent till just now."

"airbending," Ikki laughed, "how else? Anyways, how are Cato and Clove?"

"Weird," Katara laughed with the younger girl, "well, I guess it's to be expected, but they're fighters."

"That's exactly what they are," Ikki explained, "so they're not as bad as they seem—just make sure you're skilled enough to hold your own in a fight with them if you want their respect. Not all victors are created equal, be it in size, shape, or skill."

"That reminds me," Katara replied, "Are there Peacekeepers in this district?"

"Of course," Ikki replied, "but they tend to remain in the shadows. Do be careful what you say though—the same rules that apply in your home district will apply here."

"So how do you know so much about the place," Katara raised her eyebrow, "you've only been here 2 years, haven't you?"

"I know a lot of inner workings," Ikki whispered, "including the inner workings of Republic District, The Capitol City, Districts 3, 4, 7, & 8, as well as the arenas for the 77th, 78th, and 79th Hunger Games. The Capitol has put me to some good use though, and they keep a close watch on me, so I play nice."

She paused for a moment. "But they watch you, as you probably figured. Here, follow me home and I'll give you a little bit more intel that I got."

"Alright," Katara nodded, "where do you live?"

"Just put your arms around me." Ikki replied, "Trust me."

Naturally, Katara didn't, looking at the younger girl. Ikki was several inches shorter than Katara, but there was something about her face, her friendly smile, and perhaps even something about her Yangchen mullet, that didn't give Katara an uneasy feeling. Perhaps she could trust Ikki more than most other victors here.

"Are you sure you'll be able to hold my weight?" she asked. Ikki paused for a moment, as if pondering Katara's frame. Then to Katara's surprise, she nodded.

"I'll give it a shot." She replied, and as Katara wrapped herself around Ikki's back, she formed an air shere beneath them, and took off, flying down the streets.

Ikki made the trip seem horribly short, but they were awfully close to the edge of the city, which was also much closer to the Capitol proper. Katara let go of her, and soon their feet were back on solid ground. She followed Ikki inside to see that the place was large and mostly empty. Without a word, Ikki led her downstairs into the basement.

"They watch me," she pointed out, "everywhere except down here."

"What's different down here?" Katara raised an eyebrow.

"I've reengineered the tracking devices." She replied, "I couldn't do it everywhere or else they would know what I was up to. It's actually a pretty complicated story, but it's totally worth it."

"Would you mind sharing," Katara asked, "I get this feeling that there's something huge going on that I should really be aware of because of how important it is."

"There is something going on that is hugely important," Ikki replied, "but it's way too early to be spilling that just now. Don't worry about not knowing it just yet."

"Oh come on!" Katara exclaimed, "you can't leave me hanging on a note like that!"

Ikki simply grinned.


	14. 14 The Lay of the Land, Part 2

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: **this is somewhat of a continuation of chapter 13. If anything is to be gathered from this, it's that the conspiracies run even deeper than this.

**CHAPTER 14**

There was a pause, and Katara glared at Ikki, who eventually caved and giggled.

"Okay, I'm sorry. I couldn't pass that up. So anyways, there are things happening that The Capitol does not want people knowing about. How much attention did you pay to the 74th, 75th, 76th, 77th, 78th, and 79th Hunger Games?"

"I paid some major attention to the 79th Hunger Games." Katara rolled her eyes, "three guesses why."

"I paid attention to all of them, especially after I was chosen. " Ikki explained, "there are two things I noticed—one, so many different people were benders. The proportion of benders in Panem versus the amount of benders that have been in The Hunger Games is disproportionately high. This was even apparent in your 79th Games."

Katara thought back to the games. Including herself, there were 16 benders, which meant there were only 8 nonbenders—a 2-1 ratio. In Panem, nonbenders outnumbered benders about 4-1 or 5-1, so there was a serious skew in that game alone. Ikki began naming off tributes from the other games and mentioning the skews. The 76th Hunger Games had been comprised entirely of benders.

"What's worse," she replied, "is that Yangchen, Roku, Kyoshi, and Kuruk the gamemakers, are little more than puppets. They are as good as dead given that they don't have bending, and it seems that the Avatar kids are people who have a HUGE chance at getting picked to die."

"There were two Avatars in my games," Katara replied, "both from District 7."

"Exactly," Ikki nodded, "I killed Avatar Arkando of District 1 during my games, Avatar Jocasta of District 8 died in the 78th Games—2nd place to that District 5 boy whose name I can never remember, "Avatar Rue of District 11 died in the 74th games, and…"

It seemed that once Ikki started rambling, she wouldn't shut up until Katara spoke up.

"Ikki!" she barked,

"What," she gazed at Katara, bug-eyed.

"I get your point, carry on." Katara replied.

"So anyways," she replied, acting as if nothing had happened, "I think Avatar Aang and Avatar Korra were two of the last avatars. There is only one more that I am aware of, and either she is keeping herself on the DL, or she has no idea that she's an Avatar. All I will say about her is that she's from District 12, and that she's here in this city right now."

"Ikki, if you were trying to keep her identity a secret, you were stupid for telling me that she's from 12. That leaves only one option, and if you're telling me crazy-bitch is our only hope for the future of Avatars, then I might need another few drinks."

"Most people didn't even get the hint, actually." She replied, "People are stupid. Anyways, yeah, it's Katniss. She does not need to know this though, and don't tell anyone."

"Why the hell would I tell anyone something like that?" Katara exclaimed, "but how many other people know about it?"

"Hmm." Ikki mused, "Cato, Clove, a couple boys from 12, a girl from 4, some folks from 3, and four Capitol Citizens, one of which forced it out of me."

"Give me names." Katara cracked her knuckles.

"Fine—Gale, Haymitch, Kya, Wiress, Beetee, Pakku, Bumi, Effie, and… I forgot the last guy's name." Ikki rattled them off as if reciting them from memory. "anyways, it's not like those will do you any good. What you need are a few of these."  
Ikki passed Katara a few Pai Sho tiles. Katara recognized them as Lotus tiles, except for one, which had a mockingjay on it. She picked it up and asked about it.

"Flip it over." Ikki replied without even looking up. Katara did as told and noticed that there was a lotus on the back. She flipped the three other lotus tiles over and say that there were mockingjays on the backs of each one.

"There's symbolism here, I know it." Katara replied, "Katniss is either the Lotus or the Mockingjay."

"She's neither, right now actually. If there was a symbol for Avatar that we could use without The Capitol knowing, she'd be that, hands down. I don't know who either of them are, but what we're trying to do is not overthrow The Capitol, but we're trying to get rid of the Equalist influence."

"So why are the Avatars important?"

"To counteract the bending removal triggered by the Equalists," Ikki answered, "only Avatars can properly restore bending. Ideally, we want Katniss to be able to restore the Four Avatars that run as gamemakers. However, our lack of a solid leader hasn't gotten us far, but you should keep those tiles handy. They will be important for the 80th Hunger Games."

"How are tiles going to affect a Hunger Games? Do they explode or something?"

"It's part of an alliance," Ikki replied, "see, I'm also a gamemaker, and I have helped design every arena since the 77th Games. There's a reason they watch me closely—I won my games in a very unorthodox way. I took control of the arena from the gamemakers, and made it work in my favor, frying everyone else. My technological proficiency had them drag me into creating the next two arenas for their enjoyment. However, it was seen as an act of rebellion—and that was the last time I saw my mother or my siblings. My dad Tenzin was picked the following year for The 79th Hunger Games through a rigged lottery. That is why we are not staging a rebellion—we are simply staging an alliance."

"We're victors. We don't have to go back to the games."

"Yes we do—in fact, it's going to be some of us. See, they're bringing back the Grand Quarter Quell this year—the one they were going to do in Game 75, but lacked the proper people to do it. The Quarter Quell is going to be comprised of victors from previous games."

"No," Katara exclaimed, "they can't do this!"

"Oh hush," Ikki replied, "there are at least two other girls from 8—Hama, Cecilia, and I swear there was at least one more… but anyways, the reason I brought you here is because I need you to volunteer with me. The others who are in on the operation understand this. Katniss, as dangerous as she is, needs to be protected. She is the Capitol's main target."

"What is she doing that's so bad?"

"They're onto the belief that she's an Avatar. Either she doesn't believe it herself, or she's got incredible willpower for keeping it secret. They're trying to get her back in the arena, because that's the only way that they know they can properly kill her without angering the citizens of the Capitol."

"Can't you just rig the odds so that she won't get picked?" Katara raised an eyebrow.

"I would if I could," Ikki replied, "but she's the only girl from District 12. If I'm not mistaken, she truly is the last Avatar, and that is why she is so important. That's the mission—that's why I'm here."


	15. 15 Hunger Games: The Last Avatar

**AUTHOR'S NOTES**: This is one of those titles that would be more appropriate to give to the next group of chapters as a whole, but also simply because I liked the ironic switcharound in titles.

**CHAPTER 15**

"So let me get this straight." Katara repeated, "Katniss is the last Avatar, we're not even sure she knows this, and because the next Hunger Games is going to reap its tributes from surviving victors and she's the only district 12 girl, she's guaranteed to get picked."

"Correct," Ikki nodded, "The Capitol hasn't made the announcement yet, but they will. And, do you really think that with that small of a tribute pool that they won't rig it? No—they'll go for the most powerful benders. I'm almost certain that if I don't volunteer, that I'll get picked anyways, and that Cato and Clove are also up for it. They might just volunteer though."

"There's still over 11 months to plan that stuff out though," Katara explained, "we need a plan."

"You'll be a big help, actually." She replied, "because of your victory tour in 6 months. Obviously you don't want to give some sort of rebel-rousing speech or anything. Say what the Capitol wants you to say, but as you do, watch the looks on the faces of the people. There will be some that see through your words and know that you are part of what we're doing."

"Rebellion," Katara raised her eyebrow, "of course. District 8's been getting cracked down on because of all that stuff. I'm more than used to it."

"That is precisely why I knew you'd be a great help!" Ikki beamed, "of the Districts, 8 will probably be the first to go. They will be followed by 3, then perhaps 12, 4, 7, and 11."

"What about the others," Katara asked,

"We don't need to take control of all of the districts to cripple the Capitol. Think of what these industries are: Agriculture, Mining, Fishing, Technology, Textiles, and Lumber. It's a matter of building things and supporting a population. I figure the Capitol has the tightest grip on '11 out of all of those, because of what it's about. Think about it."

"Well, we can't eat luxury goods, masonry won't make good weaponry, I figure you have plans for transportation, and then grain and livestock are the others. What about District 5?"

"That's the only problem I saw in the plan," Ikki nodded, "power. But, think about it—we have firebenders, and we have coal miners from 12. If we secure that little district, we will have it covered, the old fashioned Fire Nation way. Nothing is going to happen for at least a year though. This is going to be an Operation: 80th Hunger Games."

"You know what this sounds like," Katara narrowed her eyes.

"Let me guess," Ikki smirked, "War."

"You say that as if you have hopes to succeed against The Capitol." Katara argued,

"You're only talking like that because it's never been done before." Ikki beamed.

"Actually," Katara shook her head, "it has—why do think we HAVE the Hunger Games?"

"What," Ikki exclaimed, "people tried rebelling before?"

"Have you paid NO attention to The Capitol's propaganda?" Katara exclaimed, and then to her surprise, Ikki laughed again.

"I'm kidding." She pointed out, "of course I know about the Dark Days. There was a huge uprising, District 13 was obliterated, the Fire Nation attacked District 14 and betrayed them, and the war was soon over. This time it's going to be different though. History only repeats itself when you try the same thing over and over again."

"Ikki, all 14 districts revolted against The Capitol and they lost. What makes you think we'll win when we only have 6 on our side?"

"I have my reasons. This is not a battle of 6 and 6."

"It's 6 and 7. The other 6 districts have The Capitol."

"If you don't want to trust me, that's fine. If you do, however, then I would deeply appreciate it, as you could be a marvelous help not just for me, but for Panem. District 13 is still around."

"Even if that's true, that still only makes it 7 and 7."

"Katara," Ikki sighed, "what do you know of Districts 13 and 14?"

"13 made nukes, 14 was Panem's forge."

"Think about it. Ask your mentor, Hama, about it. Few people alive today know what they were like. Whatever the case, it's getting late. You should head home."

"You're just going to leave me hanging with a note like that?" Katara exclaimed.

"No," Ikki grinned, lowering her voice to a whisper, "I'm going to leave you on the note that I know where one of those two districts is, and that I've been there. Now you best be heading home."

Katara glared at Ikki for a moment, but she said nothing. Realizing that she was not going to say anymore, Katara fumed and stomped off, leaving Ikki alone.

However, the airbender was not alone for long. She went upstairs to find her home deserted as it usually was, but when she stepped outside to make sure Katara was not still lurking around, she was confronted by Peacekeepers.

"Come silently and nothing will happen." They warned. Ikki glanced up at both of them for a moment, and decided to go peacefully.

She found herself facing none other than Snow himself a few moments later. She was used to it, but it didn't ever bode well with her.

"Tell me, Ikki." He looked her right in the eyes, "You have a way with knowledge, yes?"

Ikki did not utter a response, but nodded.

"As extensive as it is, there are four people whose whereabouts you know nothing of. Tell me—do you ever wish to see your family again?"

Ikki's eyes widened, and she slowly nodded. It was a common trick used on her, but she was not sure if they were telling the truth or not, and she did not want to chance it.

"I am well-aware of your antics, including your search for 13 and 14. I know of your "Bender revolution," because it is an old and tired tactic that only strengthens Amon's point. Do not try to fill this new victor's head with such idle matters, or you will only get yourself and those you love, in more trouble. The Capitol has been nice to you—we return the favor to those who play our game. You have had particularly nice treatment—you are a Gamemaker, Ikki. I am aware that you know our plans for the next Hunger Games, and I am willing to keep you out of it. If that is not motivating enough, then perhaps there are other Gamemakers who can ensure that the odds are *not* in your favor."

Ikki sighed and lowered her head. "There is no new news from 13. They continue to talk about the rebellion, but they have honored the pact."

"You know what is good for you then." Snow stood up, nodding solemnly at Ikki. "That is all I wished to talk about at the moment. You may go."

Ikki nodded, and left the building. Her mind was racing, and she actually had to bite her gums to stay quiet. There was so much she wanted to tell someone—anyone; that she couldn't.


	16. 16 The Racket

**AUTHOR'S NOTES**-The quest to get to the bottom of the operations continues.

**CHAPTER 16**

Ikki soon informed Katara that it would be best for them to lay low for a while and for them not to intentionally cross paths. While Katara was her best friend, she was not the only one Ikki knew, and thus, she went on to spread her secrets to someone else.

The individual in question was Katniss Everdeen, who, while Ikki opened her bottled-up secrets, simply drank continuous shots of whatever strong drink Ikki ordered. The airbender paid her infrequent visits, and let a few weeks pass before she got back to Katara on the subject. Katara passed the time learning the ways of the walls and secrets of the Republic District.

After about 4 months of poking around, it was time to take this information back to Katniss. She may not have seemed very concerned, but she would listen as Ikki rambled.

"So basically," she muttered at the end, spitting on the floor beside "13 is the rotten underbelly of The Twin Districts. You're saying that like I should be surprised."

"You knew?" Ikki exclaimed,

"I go there all the time. They go on about a rebellion against Republic and against the metalheads. I think they're a bit closer to The Capitol than you thought."

"Metalheads," Ikki paused, but then her eyes lit up. "surely you don't mean…"

"Districts 3 and 4," Katniss finished. "Hell if I know more than that. It's not like I'm some all-knowing savior or anything. I don't even bend."

"I'll kill you for that, you lying bitch," Haymitch called out—after all, it was hard to find the two apart—or without a flask of booze within an arm's reach of them; "Unless you got Equalized or something."

"Someone's experiencing a stroke of genius." Katniss quipped, raising an eyebrow and twitching her other eye, "next drink is on me."

Haymitch nodded at her expression, and then turned to Ikki. "There isn't much the two of us can do, kiddo. We're 14 drinks in, and you know how to decipher us."

Katniss glanced at him, belching loudly. "How the hell do you come up with stuff like that?"

"Easy," he smirked, holding out an awaiting hand as Katniss passed him another bottle, "Ikki taught me."

It was not long afterwards that Katara, Cato, and Clove showed up for their usual card games. Strangely, both Cato and Clove were covered in flecks of blood, and as Clove dealt the cards, she whistled. It wasn't much of a tune, but there was a consistency to the four notes she repeated. Of the players present, only Cato nodded, and soon the four victors were deep in a string of games.

When they ended, Ikki pulled Cato aside and the two seemed to exchange a conversation. Katara turned to Clove, who was still seated.

"Where'd that blood come from?" she asked,

"The rotten underbelly of the Republic District," she replied, "how much do YOU know of Operation 80th Hunger Games?"

"Is this what this is about?" Katara exclaimed,

"Of course," Clove nodded, "Me, Cato, and a couple dudes named Hasook and Shady Shin run a racket down there. The great part about The Republic District is that as long as you're no one special…" she paused, leaning forward and grinning.

"Then no one gives a flying damn about who you are or what you do. The Peacekeepers are mobsters in the Underground. They're part of the reason The Capitol doesn't care about us anymore."

"Isn't that just asking for rebellion?" Katara exclaimed,

"Not when the only organization is crime," Clove nodded, "in fact, meet me at Block 230 tomorrow around 7:15PM. You can bring Ikki if you want, but she probably already knows this."

"Are you coming, loser?" Cato called out to Clove. She immediately jumped to her feet.

"If you were anyone else I'd give you a scar that would have made that District 5 boy count his many blessings," Clove retorted, "Zuko, I think his name was."

She paused for a moment and turned back to Katara. "Block 230," she repeated, "7:15PM—be there."

Katara nodded, and Clove and Cato left the building.

The next afternoon, Katara made her way to Block 230 with Ikki following her. It was mostly dark here as the sun was going down, but out of the shadows, Clove appeared.

"Right on time," she nodded approvingly, "now come on, I'll show you what I'm talking about. Hop in."

She motioned towards a car, which Katara and Ikki climbed into. Katara had been expecting to see Cato, but he was conspicuously absent.

"No Cato," she raised an eyebrow,

"Nah, he's already at the racket. I just came here to get you guys." Clove replied, leading them deeper into the city. She wove her way around corners, and even passed through a few tunnels, until she reached an underground city.

"Welcome to the Crack," she grinned, "the rotten underbelly of the Republic District, The Capitol, and District 13. Basically, this is where you go to sell yourself into slavery if you're not a victor or a Triad."

Katara looked around and noticed people that were clearly from some of the other districts. It definitely seemed that they were the victims of the place, as the mobs ruled the streets.

"Protection rackets," Ikki raised an eyebrow, "and it looks like a few are even gaming rackets."

"Look who's Little Miss Observant," Clove chuckled, parking on the side of the street, "this is it. This is why there is no chance of rebellion from the Republic District. The Capitol knows of it, just as they know of District 13. Guess who runs some of the mobs."

Katara noted what Clove had said, and saw the insignia of The Capitol more times than she expected to. She and the airbender followed Clove into a large building, where she saw Cato and two other men, most likely the Hasook and Shady Shin that she had mentioned earlier. Greetings were exchanged, and Shady Shin was quick to cut to the chase.

"We've got some major bets running on Hasook taking the drink in the 3rd match," Shin replied, "And Clove wiping out the others."

"And what about me," Cato raised an eyebrow,

"Someone put a huge number of yuans on you throwing the fight," Shin replied, "so make sure you don't even leave zone 1."

"You guys run a probending racket?" Katara exclaimed, "but how?"

"We share the cut," Clove chuckled, "with the Capitol, and subsequently, the Equalists. We all know that the Capitol likes money and power—keep them on top, and you can get away with anything."

"Anything," Katara raised her eyebrows.

"anything," Clove smirked, "keep that in mind—the match is about to start though, so you and Ikki should find yourselves some good seats. You'll see how the racket runs in just a moment."

Katara exchanged looks with Ikki, but she nodded, and soon the two of them were seated and ready to watch the upcoming match.


End file.
